Former Oregon Gov. Neil Goldschmidt and his wife, Diana Snowden, have filed a lawsuit in Portland claiming they were defrauded by an Arkansas-based financial firm that arranges lump-sum payments to veterans in exchange for the rights to their pension payments.

The prominent couple said in the lawsuit that they invested just over $600,000 on the promise that they would get a safe stream of monthly payments from nine contracts with veterans.

Instead, according to the lawsuit filed in Multnomah County Circuit Court, Goldschmidt and his wife, the former superintendent of Portland Public Schools, soon found out that federal law doesn't allow military pensions to be sold and that it was far from a safe investment.

The couple has kept a low public profile since 2004, when Goldschmidt acknowledged sexually abusing a minor when he was mayor of Portland in the 1970s and quit his lobbying business.

The selling of pension rights has come under increased scrutiny in recent years. Both veterans and investors have claimed that companies specializing in these deals have taken advantage of them.

Goldschmidt and his wife filed the lawsuit against Voyager Financial Group of Little Rock, Ark., as well as one of the firm's executives, Andrew Gamber, and two others involved in marketing the investment, David Woodard and Cliff Sullivan.

Woodard and Gamber did not respond to calls for comment. Sullivan, a mortgage broker in Portland, said he was victimized by the company, too.

Sullivan, who said he has known Goldschmidt and Snowden for several years, said he was assured that the investment could go sour only if the U.S. government defaulted on its pension payments.

Woodard "misrepresented to me and my clients that these contracts were irrevocable," Sullivan said. He added that Woodard seemed to be employed by the company but was apparently an independent contractor.

"I was lied to and deceived in the whole process," Sullivan said. "I'd never sell anything I thought was harmful or bad.

A California judge recently awarded $2.9 million to 63 veterans who had made a pension deal with a company called Structured Investments. The judge ruled that the military pensions could not be turned over to another party.

Attorney Robert Bramson, who represented the veterans, said investors also won an arbitration ruling against the firm because it did not disclose that the class-action suit by the veterans could endanger the investments.

The veterans also argued in their lawsuit that the contracts were structured so that they in effect paid a rate of interest above what was allowed by California's usury laws.

Legal rulings have been mixed on whether companies can seek to enforce contracts that veterans have signed to turn over part or all of their pensions, Bramson said.

The Goldschmidt lawsuit said the couple bought nine investment contracts between April of 2011 and March of 2012 for a total of $601,599. The lawsuit asks for the return of the money, plus interest, as well as their legal costs.